The present invention relates to a photographic printer and more particularly to a photographic printer which can make prints of video images and of photographic images.
There are photographic printers for selectively printing on a photographic paper a video image such as a CRT image displaying on a phosphor screen and a photographic image recording on a photographic film. One such photographic printer which is disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication (Kokai) No. 58-122,529, is provided with a lamp unit incorporating therein a printing lens, a negative carrier, a condenser lens, color correction filters, and a white light source. A photographic paper, movable in the horizontal direction, is provided over the lamp unit. Between the lamp unit and the photographic paper, there is a CRT unit which is removably insertable into the printing path of the photographic printer. This CRT unit comprises a CRT, a color filter assembly in a turret disk, a printing lens, and a reflection mirror for directing an image displayed on the CRT downward to the photographic paper. In the case of printing a photographic image formed in a film, for example, a color negative film, the lamp unit is used while the CRT unit is removed from the printing path. On the other hand, in the case of printing a video image, the CRT unit is inserted into the printing path and an image on the CRT is printed on the photographic paper in three-color sequential exposure.
One problem with such photographic printers is that the CRT unit, which generally is heavy, has to be set in the printing path every time a video image is printed. This setting of the CRT unit is quite troublesome.
In an attempt at avoiding the troublesome setting operation of such conventional photographic printers, there has been proposed a photographic printer which is disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Unexamined Application No. 61-246,980, in which a CRT unit for video image printing is stationarily disposed therein. In such a photographic printer, the CRT is used as a light source for illuminating a film from which a print of a photographic image is made.
The photographic printers for selectively printing video images on a CRT and a photographic image formed in a film need a large CRT whose screen is usually between five and nine inches to provide a sharp image of print of a video image. A video image is displayed on a whole area of the CRT screen and is reduced for video image printing. When the large size CRT is used as a printing light source for photographic image printing, light is emitted over the whole area of the CRT screen.
When a large CRT having, for example, a seven inch screen is used as a printing light source to illuminate a 35 mm-size format of film which has an image area of approximately 24.times.36 mm (the most popular photographic film), about 90 percent of illumination light emanating from the CRT is unused. In addition to such inefficient use of illumination light from the CRT, because the luminance of the CRT is lower than that of halogen lamps generally used in photographic printers, a long exposure time is required for photographic image printing.